Sonic: Lost Hope
by WynneCluster
Summary: When Sonic and friends go to foil Dr. Robotnik's animal snatching scheme, things seem a little too simple... Will he heroic hedgehog triumph, or will the villainous Doctor's latest scheme finally win him the world? Rewrite of Sonic Lost World.
1. Chapter 1

The skies were blue, the clouds white and fluffy, a mild breeze blew across the expanse of green hills below.

Truly, this was a perfect day, thought Doctor Ivo Robotnik. A perfect day... To crush!

"Ooh, I quite like that one!" the nefarious Doctor suddenly said aloud inside his patented Egg Mobile, clapping his hands together as the machine automatically moved into auto-pilot at the lack of touch.

Truly a marvel of engineering, he thought as he pulled out a notebook to write down his latest villainous one-line.

"There he goes talking to himself again," Orbot, the Doctor's small red and roundish robotic attendant bemoaned, his synthesized voice sounding calm and refined.

"Why do you think he does that so much?" Cubot, Orbot's yellow squarish companion asked, his voice more high pitched and seemingly tuned to make him sound somewhat nasally.

"Oh quiet, you two!" Robotnik yelled and turned around in his seat to yell at his bumbling creations, "I do not talk to myself, why do you think I created you two?"

The two robots were quiet for a moment as they considered, before Orbot offered a suggestion.

"Manual labour?"

"Backup RAM?" Cubot chimed in.

"Extra eyes so you'll know we're being pursued?" Orbot pointed out the window behind them as he spoke.

"Emergency footrests!"

"To make you look comparatively competent?"

"Sous chefs!"

"See? Multi-purpose creations, now that's the sign of true genius!" Ivo went back to his journal before doing a double take, "wait what was that third one?"

The Egg Mobile jerked suddenly down and to one side, the tether attached to the bottom suddenly becoming strained and swinging from the capsule attached to it.

"What!?" Robotnik exclaimed as he turned around and looked out behind him, seeing a familiar biplane piloted by a two-tailed fox, "Tails, but then that means-"

He cut himself off as he pressed his face against the glass to look down at the swinging capsule and the blue menace he knew would be there,grinning back at him cockily.

"Sorry to drop in so suddenly," Sonic the Hedgehog quipped as he swung from one side of the Egg Mobile to the other, "but I'm gonna need to see a permit for these animals you're transporting!"

"Grrrr, Sonic!" the Doctor growled at his long-time nemesis, "you know full well that I'm banned from even applying for that paperwork!"

"Well that's what you get for being a repeat offender!" Sonic yelled and jumped onto the Egg Mobile proper, standing on the narrow lip on the front with his hands planted firmly on his hips "now we can do this the easy way or the hard way, your choice."

While his tone was overall fairly light, Sonic had Robotnik caught in a firm and aggressive stare. Clearly he wasn't prepared to let the Doctor off easily.

Robotnik quickly glanced back towards Tails and the Tornado as he weighed his options, before turning back to Sonic with a friendly smile.

The hedgehog tensed up.

"Well as tempting as your offer is, I'm afraid my plans are a little far along for that," he leaned back and smirked, "maybe if you were a little *faster* then giving up might have been worth my while."

"Excuse me?" Sonic's eyes widened and he let out a surprised chuckle, dropping his guard for just a moment, "if you want to see speed-!"

"How about you show me!" Robotnik took his chance while Sonic was distracted by the insult to his speedster pride to hit a button inside the cockpit, releasing the latch on the capsule with an audible clanking sound.

Sonic's eyes widened in surprise. He glanced to the capsule, falling away from the Egg Mobile. He glared at Robotnik who was grinning to himself. He looked toward Tails who was similarly shocked to see the capsule dropped.

The Tornado was still trailing behind, and even worse it wasn't equipped to rescue such a bulky object falling from the sky.

Sonic hopped over the cockpit, grabbed the back lip and lined himself up. He knew he had to get his trajectory just right to get to the capsule in time. He positioned his feet just right and kicked off, launching himself downward after the capsule and pushing the Egg Mobile off course again.

The time between the capsule being released and Sonic kicking off couldn't have been more than a second.

By the time Tails had reacted enough to steer the Tornado into a dive Sonic was almost at the capsule already.

Robotnik righted the Egg Mobile and grinned at his nemesis falling down to earth.

"Predictable," he sped away towards his latest secret base, chuckling to himself, "those fools will squander their advantages saving the animals and give me all the time I need to prepare my new ultimate weapon!"

He gesticulated wildly and laughed an evil laugh as Orbot and Cubot shrugged at each other.

Meanwhile Sonic was still plummeting to the earth alongside the capsule. His added momentum from his kick-off let him just catch up with the machine and he grabbed the huge yellow button on top with both hands.

"Alright, got it!" he exclaimed with a smile, the wind rushing past as he fell.

And he fell.

And his smile fell as well.

"Now what?" he asked, more to himself than anything else.

"Soooniiic~" Tails' voice rose above the rushing wind as the Tornado rushed down toward Sonic and the capsule.

The heroic hedgehog grinned for a moment before looking down at the rapidly approaching ground. There wasn't much time, and he knew they had to slow the descent of the capsule or...

"Tails!" he screamed to be heard by his pal and kicked his legs, "bring the wing in!"

Tails gasped as he realized what his friend was planning, "b-but Sonic-!"

"The plane or the animals we can only save one!" Sonic insisted, his tone clearly leaving no room for argument.

Tails yelled in frustration but complied, swinging the plane in irresponsibly close. He expertly guided the wings around his friend so that Sonic could hook his legs around the struts.

"Got it!" Sonic yelled as he firmly gripped the Tornado's wing struts with his legs, "now, pull up!"

Tails grunted again in annoyance. He loved his friend, but sometimes Sonic's daredevil antics were difficult to put up with.

Making sure to not slam Sonic directly into the wings, a very difficult task considering the situation, Tails pulled the Tornado in a mostly upward direction.

Immediately Sonic yelled out in pain, his body being strained between the pull of the heavy capsule and the Tornado's pull. The descent was slowed, but the ground was still quickly approaching and the pain made it difficult to focus.

"You're the one I was worried about, Sonic!" Tails yelled, "I can build a new Tornado, but if you-"

"I'll be fine!" Sonic screamed, "just keep slowing me down and jump out before you hit the ground!"

Tails' hands shook on the controls. He said nothing more, and just focused on the approaching ground. He tried to ignore his friend's pained screams for the five seconds before they were close enough to the ground.

"Now, jump!" Sonic yelled at once and unhooked his legs from the Tornado. Tails didn't question and just followed as his friend told him, letting the airplane spiral away and crash into a nearby rock as he flew safely away.

Sonic didn't get off so easily. A split second after letting go of the Tornado the capsule hit the ground and Sonic slammed face first into the button, releasing the shaken up animals, before bouncing off and tumbling along the grass for a few feet.

Sonic rolled to a stop and immediately looked to the open capsule. To his relief the animals were fine, and he let out a sigh of relief before a groan of pain.

"Sonic!" Tails' concerned voice rung through the air almost before Sonic could start feeling the pain from his reckless stunt, as the young fox touched down right next to him, "are you alright?"

"Ah, nothing an ice pack can't fix!" Sonic said boldly before jumping onto his feet to show off, only to wince in pain immediately, "actually, make it a full spa day for this one."

Tails sighed and shook his head, but smiled a little. He was too relieved in the moment to try and chastise his friend for reckless heroism.

Sonic returned the smile as he rolled his shoulders. While it the strain had hurt, he had been through a lot worse in the past and he knew he would be fine.

The two were broken away from their relief over the successful animal rescue by a beeping from Tails' hand. Just before escaping the Tornado he had grabbed the tablet computer he'd built.

"Oh, someone's calling us," Tails said as he pressed a few buttons and brought up a video feed, "Amy, what's up?"

"Tails! Are you okay? Where's Sonic?" Amy asked in a panic, the video feed of her face shaking and blurring as she shook her device on the other end, "is he okay? We saw you both falling and there was a huge crash and-!"

"Amy! We're fine!" Sonic said as he stepped behind Tails, bringing him into the frame on Amy's end.

"What do you mean fine!?" Amy yelled when she caught sight of Sonic, "you look almost like you had a fight with Metal!"

Sonic looked down at himself in surprise. He looked pretty dirty from his roll through the field, but Amy was pretty clearly exaggerating.

"Aw, come on," he started, it's not THAT-"

"Never mind that!" Knuckles yelled and grabbed the tablet from Amy, ignoring her protest, "are the animals alright? That's the whole reason we're out here in the first place after all!"

Tails looked over at the capsule, where the animals were staggering around dizzily but clearly were in better shape then Sonic at least.

"Well, they look a little shaken..." Tails said with trepidation before finishing more confidently, "but they're okay!"

"Alright, good," Knuckles said before looking off into the sky, "Robotnik went that way, I'm going to follow him."

"What, don't you think I can handle this on my own?" Sonic asked with a grin, "I bet I'll have the whole animal rescue finished up before you even get there."

"This isn't a game, Sonic," Knuckles said coldly and narrowed his eyes, "Robotnik was quiet for months, and now he's back on his old animal abduction game suddenly?

"Something's not right about all this, it's too simple."

"Knuckles is right," Tails stroked his chin thoughtfully, "whatever Robotnik is up to, it's gotta be more complicated than just what we're seeing now."

"Well then, I guess we'll just have to go find out the hard way!" Sonic said with a grin, "race you there, Knux!"

Knuckles tried to respond, but Sonic was already gone, speeding off in the direction Robotnik had fled to.

"Agh, darnit!" he yelled and shoved the tablet back at Amy, "take this, I'm going after him!"

"Hey! Rude!" Amy huffed and turned back to the screen, "sorry Tails, gotta go, I need to make sure those two don't get themselves into any more serious trouble!"

She turned the call off before Tails could respond, leaving him to sigh and talk to himself.

"Bye Amy, bye Knuckles, bye Sonic," he shook his head, "I'll catch up once I see what I can salvage from the Tornado."

He slowly walked toward his downed aircraft, thinking about Knuckles' words.

"I should do this quickly," he said with determination, "just grab my tools and run, Sonic might need me!"


	2. Chapter 2

Robotnik stood proud in his weapons factory, looking over the machines creating his Badniks and inserting the various cuddly animals inside to serve as a power source. An old technology, and one he hadn't used in some time, but a fairly efficient means of creating an army.

Behind him, half obscured by shadows, was a hulking red being with black horns and blue claws and a blue ponytail wearing spiked bracelets who was glaring at the Doctor. Three more figures stood behind him but were totally obscured in the darkness.

"What do you think of my little operation here, Zavok?" the evil Doctor asked the large man, "not to root my own horn too much, but I'd say I run a pretty tight ship!"

"I think you are a coward, Robotnik," Zavok replied coldly, "you snivel and scheme behind armies, and use innocent creatures as shields."

Robotnik scoffed and turned back to his machines, his mood clearly soured.

"Contractors, always with the opinions," he waved off Zavok's comments, "you're even more annoying than a certain crocodile I know."

"I would hardly call you my employer," Zavok growled and took a steadying breath, "yet I am obliged to follow your orders for now."

"Hmph, don't act so high and mighty," Robotnik sneered, "the way I hear it, hiring your little 'Deadly Six' is a decent way to end up with a knife in the back!"

"How DARE you!" from the darkness a second horned figure emerged, this one lanky and pink with purple hair and wearing the same spiked bracelets as Zavok as well as a choker, his face set in a snarl, "Lord Zavok is an honorable man, not like some conniving-!"

"Peace, Zazz!" Zavok yelled to his purple companion, though he was clearly having trouble containing himself as well, "remember the Master."

"O-of course, Milord," Zazz inclined his head to Zavok and took a few deep breaths, but seemed to be about as wound up as before.

Robotnik seemed to be about to make another comment, as always a stranger to restraint, but was interrupted by a voice coming through the intercom.

"Doctor, it seems Sonic has taken the bait and is moving through the first of the zones outlined in your plan as scheduled," Orbot said through the speaker, "unfortunately, he's also destroying the security network rather wholly, so we can't ascertain if he's alone right now."

"Whether he's coming alone or not, it doesn't matter," Robotnik sneered, "without the Tornado, his friends likely won't be able to keep up with him anyway."

Robotnik turned to look at the two members of the Deadly Six that were visible to him and scowled.

"As for you, I'd say it's about time you pulled your weight around here!" he pointed at Zavok boldly, "send someone to the first checkpoint outlined in the plan, I'll trust you know enough to handle the rest yourselves."

"You disrespectful-" Zazz walked past Zavok in a rage, "over and over you insult and belittle us, I should rip you apar-"

"Prisoner status," Robotnik said simply, grinning as Zazz stopped and both he and Zavok looked at him fearfully.

"The prisoners are currently stable," Orbot responded through the intercom, "but I am linked to their cages and prepared to administer a controlled shock at your command, Doctor."

Zavok growled upon hearing the robot's information, and Zazz clenched his fists together and clenched his eyes shut but didn't back away from Robotnik.

"Remember the penalty for insubordination," the Doctor said coldly, "keep letting that temper of your fly and that old man you all seem to care for so much will get it!"

"You... snake, I-" Zazz raised one hand, flexing his clawed fingers menacingly. Robotnik simply looked past him to Zavok with a smirk.

"Control yourself!" Zavok yelled through a grimace, making Zazz lower his arms instantly, "no matter how distasteful he is, you must be calm."

Zazz clenched his teeth and hands and took some deep breaths. Zavok eyed him closely. He wasn't used to seeing this much restraint from his temperamental friend. Seeing him struggle like that was a new experience, and a part of him wanted to keep on watching, but it would be bad for all of them if he actually lost control.

"Zazz will take the first checkpoint," Zavok declared suddenly, his authoritative voice drawing the room's attention to him immediately, "no matter how difficult you might find this hedgehog, I'm certain that Zazz will have him well in hand."

"Really?" Robotnik eyed the purple warrior up and down skeptically, "he doesn't exactly look like much, why don't you go to the first checkpoint instead?"

Zazz growled at the insult but stopped when Zavok put one of his large hands between the angry zeti and the Doctor.

"Don't underestimate us, Doctor," Zavok said coldly, "Zomom and I had already worked out a strategy for dealing with your blue pest days ago."

Robotnik raised an eyebrow, clearly expecting him to elaborate. Zavok simply chuckled.

"We don't exactly have the time to waste chatting here," he said and nodded to Zazz, who started to leave, "unless you want Sonic to reach the checkpoint before Zazz."

"Hmph," Robotnik crossed his arms and looked away haughtily, "well whatever plan you have, I hope you enjoy seeing it blow up in your face."

"Whatever Lord Zavok has planned I'm sure it will work better than your machinations, snake!" Zazz spat before running out of the factory.

"Wait, HE doesn't know the plan?" Robotnik asked incredulously and pointed after him.

"He doesn't need to," Zavok said simply as he walked into the darkness.

"Tch, insufferable," Robotnik stalked away, "you should all be glad I'm not doling out punishments for attitude!"

Whether Zazz succeeded or failed actually mattered little, though Robotnik didn't need to know that. Zavok took a steadying breath.

He couldn't trust the Doctor to keep up his end of the bargain, but he had to play along until he could figure something out. And if a few inconsequential pests happened to get squashed then that was fine by him.

The area was covered in beautiful green grass as far as the eye could see, dotted with healthy trees and oddly small cliffs that were at a good height for supersonic hedgehogs to vault over.

But it was also dotted with machinery and crawling with Badniks, though the number of each was being reduced as a blue blur streaked across the fields and blasted the various machines to bits.

Sonic smashed through a line of Badniks, releasing the animals contained within. He stopped for a moment to look at them, making sure that they were okay before he continued running.

"It's exhausting taking out each one, but I can't just leave them in there," Sonic said aloud before realizing there was nobody around to hear, "right, Tails is back at the Tornado..."

Sonic wasn't a stranger to being alone, but it had been a while since he'd last traveled alone. He hadn't kept far from Tails ever since...

He let his thoughts trail off and he slowed to a walk. It had been a while since he'd thought about the time before he and Tails had stopped going their separate ways.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts. There was nothing to be gained by getting lost in thought. He took a deep breath and was about to start running when he noticed something odd.

Just to his left, there was a dead sapling. The tiny tree was small, but its cracked bark and the blackened leaves around its base made it stand out against the otherwise vibrant flora.

"Well, that's one point for Knuckles I guess," Sonic said as he glared to the machinery visible just ahead, "things definitely aren't very simple, are they?"

Sonic sped off to take out the Badniks ahead. He knew he was being led into a trap and being slowed down, but he couldn't abandon the animals. Robotnik knew that.

It was an old trick, but it had never thwarted Sonic before and it wasn't going to this time. He had to believe that.

Knuckles ran through the greenery in search of Sonic, his face screwed up in a grimace. Thankfully the piles of Badnik scrap and various animals walking away from them made finding the hedgehog's trail fairly simple. Catching up was proving difficult however.

"Grrrr, would it kill him to slow down and listen to me for once?" Knuckles asked aloud, rather used to talking to himself from the solitude on Angel Island.

"You'd think he'd learn not to go rushing into obvious traps after he got jettisoned into space multiple times," Knuckles continued to grumble, noting that the distance of the animals from the Badniks they'd been released from was growing shorter.

He was catching up, at least. All the quicker to give Sonic a piece of his mind and get him to cooperate for-

Knuckles stumbled suddenly and almost fell. Something was. Wrong. Very wrong.

"I knew it," Knuckles glared ahead, and started running once more, "I wouldn't even be surprised if Sonic could feel this."

Knuckles started running as fast as his legs could take him. Robotnik had too much time to plan, and there was no telling what he had come up with this time.

"I've come up with the perfect plan this time, if I dare to say so!" Robotnik chuckled, looking at the readouts on his computer monitor, "at this rate I might even have my latest ultimate weapon finished before Sonic gets done thrashing those so-called Deadly Six!"

The monitor was attached to a large machine with two glowing windowed chambers to either side. A slight green glow came from the right window, and a slight purple glow came from the other. The yellow Chaos Emerald was stored in a glass container next to the terminal.

Behind Robotnik was a pulsing energy cage was sitting behind Robotnik, and from there a small and frail voice spoke.

"Such little confidence in the mercenaries you worked so hard to acquire," Master Zik, a tiny and wizened zeti, sighed, "I'm not sure if I'm more upset at the insult to my pupils, or more frustrated at your shortsighted arrogance."

"Hmph, don't flatter your students so much," Robotnik waved the old man off dismissively, "if I needed extra muscle I could have just built it, your knowledge was the real prize."

"The arrogance of youth," Zik spat, "you assume much of what your machines can accomplish."

"And you assume much of what your pupils can accomplish!" Robotnik rebuked, raising a fist dramatically, "for all your hokey mysticism you fail to comprehend the power of Robotnik!"

"And here's the ego," Master Zik turned away, "please spare me the idle boasting, I've heard the like many times before."

"Think what you want," Robotnik muttered, studying the readouts once more, "I've built this off the back of my grandfather's research and my own hard work, you were just one more piece of the puzzle."

Zik closed his eyed and focused himself inward. In a thousand years he'd been through far worse than anything the Doctor could put him through, so his being confined was hardly an issue.

He focused a thin tendril of consciousness through the energy field around the cage. It was designed to completely block his psionic abilities, but as with everything Robotnik created there were flaws. Unfortunately his innate zeti ability to control electronic signals was rather limited.

He was an old man by the time computers came around and the ability was even discovered, so he couldn't control the machines like the young'uns. But he was able to tune in to the data feeds and observe Robotnik's security reports. He could only hope he'd manage to get a chance to use the information he gleaned...

It didn't take him long to find the camera trained on Zazz' position. The feed crackled to life inside his mind, showing both Zazz and a wide area in front of him.

True to form, his most volatile apprentice was pacing around impatiently and staring out into the distance. He was on top of a Badnik deployment platform guarding one of Robotnik's animal-holding capsules, overlooking the wide green fields where the Deadly Six had first had the misfortune of meeting Robotnik.

Bait, it was clear, for that 'Sonic the Hedgehog' that his captor was so worried about. The name was familiar to Zik, everyone had heard of the famous hero who had saved the planet so many times over of course, but he had trouble putting faith in the tales.

Never in all of his years had any being matched what stories told of Sonic, and Zik was sure that his reputation was mostly exagerrated. Zazz would almost certainly crush the famous 'Blue Blur' and Zik would have to keep looking for a way to keep Robotnik from disposing of his pupils once their usefulness was up.

A shape blurred into focus in the fields, zipping around to various clusters of machines and destroying them. The speed was there, it seemed, but Zik doubted still that the fabled hero would put up much of a show against his apprentice.

The shape coalesced into a thin blue figure faster than the camera could process, and Sonic the Hedgehog was there.

"Hey, spiky!" the cocky hedgehog called out to Zazz, who turned in surprise as he hadn't noticed the hedgehog's approach, "you one of Robotnik's latest welcome mats?"

The hedgehog grinned, and from what happened next Zik almost had no ability to react.

In some ways the stories had undersold that hero, Sonic the Hedgehog.


End file.
